2018 Lemon Bay High School Scholarship Recipients

At the 2018 awards night at LBHS the club awarded two $2,000 scholarships. One to Nicholas Hull and the other to Valerie Pappalardo. The money was raised from the previous plant sales. Again, we thank you all for your patronage and support of our sales.

 

Annual Plant Sale

Annual Plant Sale

Annual Plant Sale

In April 2009 the Men’s Garden Club of Englewood started a South West Florida Horticultural Class on gardening. Participants are not required to be members of the club. The class was a season long gardening and learning experience in an outdoor setting. The goal was to produce 500 potted plants in prime condition and ready to sell at the Garden Club’s December Plant sale. The only cost to the individuals was their commitment to learn and to nurture the plants during the growing season. Since we had much success with this endeavor over the last few years we have been continuing this project.

Members work and learn throughout the year while propagating fully grown, ready to transplant, local native flora. The plants are then sold at our Annual Plant Sale in December. Proceeds from the plant sale are used to provide a scholarship to an eligible Lemon Bay High School (LBHS) student and to champion selected community projects using the club’s financial and member’s physical resources.

Lemon Bay High School Scholarship

In 2008 funds raised from our plant sales were used to provide a $1,000 scholarship to a Lemon Bay High School student who has an interest in gardening or a related science such as Biological, Environmental, or Horticultural and is enrolled in college program.

This endeavor was one that coincided with the club’s 40th anniversary. The celebration of the club’s 40th anniversary was held at the May Picnic Meeting at Lemon Bay Park and the scholarship winner was announced. As of 2018, the year of our fiftieth anniversary, there were 13 students who received a scholarship from the garden club with a total of $23,000 awarded. The money was all obtained through the efforts of our members who participate in our propagation sessions and help out at the plant sales. A very big thank you goes to Paul and Peg Jarvi who let us use their Garden for the plant propagation and plant sales.

We also extend a thank you to all of you who contributed to the success of our last plant sales. They include the people who supported us by stopping by and purchasing plants, members who assisted in growing and selling the plants. We also thank Elaine Miller, of Suncoast Architects, for letting us use her property for the plant sale site in the early phases of our endeavors.

Outdoor Classroom Project

At our December, 2011 meeting the members approved a project for the Lemon Bay Conservancy’s Wildflower Preserve (WFP). The project included allocation of funds to purchase materials and to build an outdoor classroom. The project consisted of cutting lumber, prefabricating the benches and installing them at the WFP. There was a total of nine benches arranged in a semi-circle with the tenth bench, for the instructor, facing the class room benches. On Saturday, December 17th, several members of the club visited the WFP to evaluate the site where we planned to place the benches. There were two work sessions planned in January to complete the project. On Saturday, January 14th, the prefabrication of the benches was completed and a second work session was scheduled for Saturday, January 21st for the installation of the benches at WFP.

The completed classroom at WFP was the location for our February 14th, 2012 meeting. There was a short dedication ceremony followed by a trail walk to view the flora and fauna at the preserve.